Cape Town - Cape Town Tourism’s (CTT) pocket-friendly domestic travel campaign, in partnership with various travel agencies, was showing signs of success in reigniting the city’s tourism and hospitality industries after launching just two week ago.
Economic growth and tourism mayco member James Vos said new figures from Travelstart and Cape Town International Airport revealed the success of CTT’s domestic travel campaign, which was a partnership between CTT, Travelstart, Safarinow and Club Travel booking platforms that offered locals discounts on flights, accommodation and experiences.
Travelstart senior commercial manager Linda Balme said the minute the president made it clear that he was not changing the travel bans between the provinces, South Africans started booking fast and furiously to get to Cape Town.
Balme said their role in the domestic travel campaign was to stimulate domestic travel sufficiently to replace the international travel that was lost as a result of the Covid-19 lockdown with travel bans.
“The minute there was peace of mind that people would not be stuck in Cape Town, our booking trajectory went crazy and we had a major increase in last-minute bookings,” said Balme.
In the past, December holidays would have been booked two to three months in advance but this year bookings were made two to three days in advance.
Balme said this boost meant their arrivals had almost passed those of 2020 and they would soon be looking at pre-Covid-19 figures again.
TravelStart indicated over 25 000 flights had already been booked through its system for December alone.
“Similarly, the team at Cape Town International Airport (CTIA) says it expects over 19 000 passengers and 180 flights will be processed daily by the end of this week,” said Vos.
In addition, Vos said domestic arrivals to CTIA for the period from December 1 to December 19 showed 63% recovery when compared to the same period in 2019.
“While it’s early days, the figures point to the campaign being a boon to Cape Town’s tourism and hospitality industries. By the end of January we will share the results of a full assessment,” said Vos.